WO2019000951A1

WO2019000951A1 - Battery charging system and electrical vehicle charging station comprising same

Info

Publication number: WO2019000951A1
Application number: PCT/CN2018/075260
Authority: WO
Inventors: 林海岩; 李楠; 丁习坤; 田小涛
Original assignee: 蔚来汽车有限公司
Priority date: 2017-06-27
Filing date: 2018-02-05
Publication date: 2019-01-03
Also published as: CN109130905A; TWI745543B; TW201906272A

Abstract

A battery charging system (10), comprising one or more battery charging units, each battery charging unit comprising: a charging module (110) configured to adapt to charge a plurality of battery packs (B1-Bn); a power switching module (120) comprising a plurality of charging channels, wherein each of the plurality of battery packs (B1-Bn) establishes a charging connection with the charging module (110) via the respective corresponding charging channel; a communication switching module (130) comprising a plurality of communication channels, wherein each of the battery packs (B1-Bn) establishes a communication connection with the charging module (110) via the respective corresponding communication channel; and a local monitoring module (140) configured to connecting to the power switching module (120) and the communication switching module (130) in each battery charging unit. Also provided is an electrical vehicle charging station (1). The battery charging system can automatically switch a charging operation between battery packs, thereby effectively improving the utilization rate of a charging device, and reducing the investments and operating costs of a charging station. During charging, it is ensured that the charging module of each battery charging unit only establishes a corresponding charging connection and communication connection with one of a plurality of battery packs, so that the safety of device operation is improved. The hierarchical monitoring architecture including a remote monitoring module and a local monitoring module enables a user to use a corresponding monitoring strategy according to actual requirements.

Description

Battery charging system and electric vehicle charging station including the same

Technical field

The present invention relates to new energy vehicle technology, and more particularly to a battery charging system for charging an electric vehicle and an electric vehicle charging station including the same.

Background technique

In order to significantly reduce the carbon dioxide emissions of automobiles, the automotive industry is investing a lot of manpower and material resources to develop new types of vehicles, such as electric vehicles, that use electricity as a power source. As the impact on the environment is smaller than that of traditional cars, the prospects for new energy vehicles are widely optimistic. However, there are still many difficulties in the popularization of the pure electric vehicle market. For example, the energy supplement of the battery is a prominent problem. Specifically, in a new type of car, the battery is used to store electrical energy. Considering safety, cost, and service life, the energy density of the currently developed electric vehicle is not high, which limits the cruising range after each charge. Therefore, providing cost-effective charging resources is an important aspect to make new energy vehicles acceptable to the market.

At present, charging stations often meet the increasing charging demand by expanding the number of chargers. However, there are many shortcomings in this way. For example, due to the high price of charging equipment, the investment and maintenance costs of operators are high; in addition, the shortage of urban land resources limits the number of chargers in a charging station.

Therefore, providing a cost-effective charging device is urgently needed in the market.

Summary of the invention

It is an object of the present invention to provide a battery charging system that is capable of providing charging resources cost-effectively.

A battery charging system in accordance with an aspect of the invention includes:

One or more battery charging units, each battery charging unit comprising:

a charging module, the charging module being configured to be adapted to charge a plurality of battery packs;

a power switching module, the power switching module includes a plurality of charging channels, wherein each of the plurality of battery groups establishes a charging connection with the charging module via respective corresponding charging channels;

a communication switching module, the communication switching module comprising a plurality of communication channels, wherein each of the plurality of battery groups establishes a communication connection with the charging module via a respective corresponding communication channel;

a local monitoring module configured to be coupled to the power switching module and the communication switching module in each of the battery charging units, and for each of the battery charging units, the local monitoring module is further configured to When it is determined that the charging operation of the currently charged battery pack is to be ended, the charging channel and the communication channel corresponding to the battery pack are disconnected, and

The charging channel and the communication channel corresponding to other battery packs in the plurality of battery packs that need to be charged are turned on.

Preferably, in the above battery charging system, the local monitoring module ensures that the charging module of each of the battery charging units establishes a corresponding charging connection and a communication connection with only one of the plurality of battery groups when charging.

Preferably, in the above battery charging system, the local monitoring module ensures that the charging module of each of the battery charging units establishes a corresponding charging connection with only one of the plurality of battery packs during charging by means of an interlocking mechanism.

Preferably, in the above battery charging system, the communication opening board is further included, and the local monitoring module is connected to the power switching module and the communication switching module of each of the battery charging units via the communication opening and closing board.

Preferably, in the above battery charging system, the local monitoring module determines whether it is necessary to end the charging operation according to the status information of the currently charged battery pack.

Preferably, in the above battery charging system, the local monitoring module communicates with the battery management system of the battery pack via the communication switching module to receive the charging request and the status information of the battery pack.

Preferably, in the above battery charging system, each of the charging channels includes a normally open DC contactor, and the local monitoring module controls the on/off state of the charging channel by controlling the normally open DC contactor.

Preferably, in the above battery charging system, the communication of the charging module of each of the battery charging units with the battery management system of the battery pack and the communication with the local monitoring module adopts a CAN bus protocol.

It is still another object of the present invention to provide an electric vehicle charging station that is capable of providing charging resources cost-effectively.

An electric vehicle charging station in accordance with an aspect of the present invention comprises:

At least one battery charging system as described above;

A remote monitoring module configured to communicate with a local monitoring module of the battery charging system.

Preferably, in the above electric vehicle charging station, the communication between the remote monitoring module and the local monitoring module adopts an Ethernet communication protocol.

Compared with the prior art, the battery charging system according to the above various aspects of the present invention can automatically switch the charging operation between the battery packs, thereby effectively improving the utilization rate of the charging device, thereby reducing the investment and operating costs of the charging station. In addition, during the charging process, the safety of the operation of the device is improved by ensuring that the charging module of each battery charging unit establishes only a corresponding charging connection and communication connection with one of the plurality of battery units. Furthermore, the hierarchical monitoring architecture including the remote monitoring module and the local monitoring module enables the user to adopt a corresponding monitoring strategy according to actual needs.

DRAWINGS

The above and/or other aspects and advantages of the present invention will be more clearly understood and understood from The drawings include:

1 is a schematic diagram of a battery charging system in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention.

2 is a flow chart of an automatic charging switching method applicable to the embodiment shown in FIG. 1.

3A is a schematic block diagram of a battery charging system in accordance with another embodiment of the present invention.

3B is a schematic block diagram of a battery charging unit applicable to the battery charging system of the embodiment shown in FIG. 3A.

4 is a schematic block diagram of an electric vehicle charging station in accordance with another embodiment of the present invention.

Detailed ways

The invention will be described more fully hereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings in which FIG. However, the invention may be embodied in different forms and should not be construed as limited to the various embodiments presented herein. The above-described embodiments are intended to be complete and complete to convey the scope of the present invention to those skilled in the art.

In the present specification, the terms "including" and "including" are used to mean that the present invention does not exclude the direct Or the case of other units and steps that are expressly stated.

Terms such as "first" and "second" do not denote the order of the elements in terms of time, space, size, etc., but merely for distinguishing the units.

It should be noted that the electric vehicles described in this specification include pure electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid vehicles.

As shown in FIG. 1, the battery charging system 10 according to the present embodiment includes a charging module 110, a power switching module 120, a communication switching module 130, and a local monitoring module 140.

In the battery charging system 10 shown in FIG. 1, the charging module 110 is a core component that converts, for example, AC power of an external power source into DC power to effect charging of the battery packs B1-Bn. As shown in FIG. 1, charging module 110 includes at least two communication interfaces to communicate with battery management systems (not shown) and local monitoring module 140 of battery packs B1-Bn, respectively.

Referring to FIG. 1, the power switching module 120 is located between the charging module 110 and the battery packs B1-Bn. In particular, the power switching module 120 includes a plurality of switching elements that are controllable in an on-off state, each switching element being coupled between the charging module 110 and one of the plurality of battery packs B1-Bn to form a corresponding charging channel. The charging module 110 is enabled to selectively charge any one of the plurality of battery packs B1-Bn or establish a charging connection with any one of the plurality of battery packs B1-Bn.

Referring again to FIG. 1, the communication switching module 130 is located between the charging module 110 and the battery packs B1-Bn to enable the charging module 110 to selectively communicate with the battery management system of any of the plurality of battery packs B1-Bn. In particular, the communication switching module 130 includes a plurality of switching elements controllable in an on-off state, each switching element being connected between the charging module 110 and a battery management system of one of the plurality of battery packs B1-Bn to form a corresponding communication. aisle. During the charging process, the charging module 110 can acquire status information of the battery pack and optimize the charging operation based on the status information by means of the established communication connection with the battery management system.

Preferably, the switching element can be, for example, a DC contactor, and more preferably a normally open DC contactor.

Preferably, the communication of the charging module 110 with the battery management system of the battery packs B1-Bn employs a CAN bus protocol.

The local monitoring module 140 is configured to be connected to the power switching module 120 and the communication switching module 130 to control the on and off states of the charging channel and the communication channel. For example, the local monitoring module 140 can turn on and off the charging channel and the communication channel by controlling the DC contactor. On the other hand, the local monitoring module 140 can also communicate with the battery management system of the battery packs B1-Bn to receive the charging request and status information of the battery pack. In the present embodiment, as shown in FIG. 1, the local monitoring module 140 communicates with the battery management system of the battery packs B1-Bn via the communication switching module 130. Preferably, the local monitoring module 140 communicates with the battery management system using a CAN bus protocol.

In addition, as shown in FIG. 1, the local monitoring module 140 can also be in communication with the charging module 110 and the remote monitoring module 160. Preferably, the local monitoring module 140 communicates with the charging module 110 using the CAN bus protocol, and the communication with the remote monitoring module 160 employs an Ethernet communication protocol.

Preferably, the battery charging system 10 shown in FIG. 1 further includes a communication opening plate 150. The local monitoring module 140 can be connected to the power switching module 120 and the communication switching module 130 via the communication opening and closing board 150 to control the on and off states of the charging channel and the communication channel.

Preferably, in the control of the on-off state of the charging channel and the communication channel, the local monitoring module 140 should ensure that the charging module 110 establishes a corresponding charging connection and communication connection with only one of the plurality of battery groups B1-Bn during operation. . More preferably, the local monitoring module 140 can ensure a single charging connection, for example by means of an interlocking mechanism.

In the present embodiment, preferably, the charging module 110 can implement automatic switching of charging operations between different battery packs B1-Bn.

The flowchart shown in FIG. 2 begins in step 201, in which the local monitoring module 140 and the charging module 110 are turned on. Optionally, in this step, the remote monitoring module 160 can also be turned on to provide a remote control function. Then, proceeding to step 202, the states of the local monitoring module 140, the remote monitoring module 160, and the charging module 110 are queried to determine whether the operation can be performed normally. If yes, the process proceeds to step 203. Otherwise, the process proceeds to step 204 to generate an alarm message of the system abnormality.

At step 203, the local monitoring module 140 receives the message from the battery management system of the battery packs B1-Bn in a polling manner. For example, as shown in FIG. 1, local monitoring module 140 communicates with battery management systems of battery packs B1-Bn via communication open-out board 150 and communication switching module 130 to receive possible charging requests.

At step 205, the local monitoring module 140 determines whether a charging request from the battery management system of the battery packs B1-Bn is received, and if there is a charging request, proceeds to step 206, otherwise returns to step 203.

At step 206, the local monitoring module 140 establishes a communication connection with the battery management system of the battery pack that sent the charging request via the communication open-out board 150 and shields communication with the battery management system of the other battery pack. It should be noted that, in this step, when there are multiple charging requests, the local monitoring module 140 may determine the charging sequence of the battery pack according to the set policy, and establish a communication connection with the battery management system of the battery group with the highest preference. .

Then, proceeding to step 207, the local monitoring module 140 communicates with the power switching module 120 via the communication opening and closing board 150, for example, instructing the power switching module 120 to turn on the charging channel corresponding to the battery pack in which the communication connection has been established in step 206 and charging the remaining ones. The channel is locked. At the same time, the local monitoring module 140 also communicates with the communication switching module 130 via the communication opening and closing board 130, for example, instructing the communication switching module 130 to only open the communication channel corresponding to the battery pack that has established the communication connection in step 206. .

Next, proceeding to step 208, the local monitoring module 140 queries the status information of the battery pack in the charged state. The status information described herein includes, for example, but is not limited to, the SOC, temperature, and the like of the battery.

Then, in step 209, the local monitoring module 140 determines whether the charging of the battery pack is completed according to the status information of the battery pack. If yes, the process proceeds to step 210, otherwise returns to step 208.

In step 210, the local monitoring module 140 communicates with the power switching module 120 and the communication switching module 130 via the communication opening and closing board 150, for example, instructing the power switching module 120 and the communication switching module 130 to switch the charging channel and the communication channel that are turned on in step 207. To the disconnected state, and the shielding of the battery management system of other battery packs is cancelled. After completing step 210, the method illustrated in FIG. 2 returns to step 203 to automatically charge the next battery pack.

It should be noted that, in the method flow shown in FIG. 2, optionally, all or part of the operations performed by the local monitoring module 140 may also be performed by the remote monitoring module 160.

Although in the embodiment shown in FIG. 1, the local monitoring module 140 manages only the operation of a battery charging unit including a charging module, a power switching module, and a communication switching module, the present invention can also be extended to the local monitoring module 140. The case where the operation of two or more battery charging units is controlled and managed.

3A is a schematic block diagram of a battery charging system in accordance with another embodiment of the present invention. In the battery charging system 10 shown in FIG. 3A, the local monitoring module 140 can simultaneously manage charging operations of a plurality of battery charging units.

3B is a schematic block diagram of a battery charging unit applicable to the battery charging system of the embodiment shown in FIG. 3A. As shown in FIG. 3B, each of the battery charging units C1-Cn includes a charging module 110, a power switching module 120, and a communication switching module 30, which have the same features, functions, and functions as the embodiment shown in FIGS. 1 and 2. principle. In particular, the local monitoring module 140 can control the charging module, the power switching module, and the communication switching module in each of the battery charging units in the same manner as the embodiment shown in FIGS. 1 and 2.

As shown in FIG. 4, the electric vehicle charging station 1 of the present embodiment includes one or more battery charging systems 10A-10N and a remote monitoring module 20 according to the embodiments described above with reference to FIGS. 1-3, wherein the remote monitoring module 20 It is configured to communicate with a local monitoring module in battery charging systems 10A-10N.

The embodiments and examples set forth herein are provided to best illustrate the embodiments of the present invention and the specific application thereof, and thereby enabling those skilled in the art to make and use the invention. However, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the above description and examples are provided for ease of illustration and illustration. The descriptions are not intended to cover the various aspects of the invention or to limit the invention to the precise forms disclosed.

In view of the above, the scope of the present disclosure is determined by the following claims.

Claims

A battery charging system, comprising:

One or more battery charging units, each of the battery charging units comprising:

a charging module, the charging module being configured to be adapted to charge a plurality of battery packs;

a power switching module, the power switching module includes a plurality of charging channels, wherein each of the plurality of battery groups establishes a charging connection with the charging module via respective corresponding charging channels;

a communication switching module, the communication switching module comprising a plurality of communication channels, wherein each of the plurality of battery groups establishes a communication connection with the charging module via a respective corresponding communication channel;

a local monitoring module configured to be coupled to the power switching module and the communication switching module of each of the battery charging units, and for each of the battery charging units, the local monitoring module Also configured to, when it is determined that the charging operation of the currently charged battery pack is to be ended, disconnect the charging channel and the communication channel corresponding to the battery pack, and cause charging of the battery pack corresponding to other batteries in the plurality of battery packs that need to be charged The channel and communication channel are turned on.
The battery charging system according to claim 1, wherein said local monitoring module ensures that a charging module of each of said battery charging units establishes a corresponding charging connection and communication with only one of said plurality of battery packs upon charging connection.
The battery charging system according to claim 2, wherein said local monitoring module ensures that a charging module of each of said battery charging units establishes a corresponding charging connection with one of said plurality of battery packs upon charging by means of an interlocking mechanism .
A battery charging system according to claim 1, further comprising a communication opening board, said local monitoring module being coupled to the power switching module and the communication switching module of each of said battery charging units via said communication opening and closing board.
The battery charging system according to claim 1, wherein said local monitoring module determines whether it is necessary to end the charging operation based on status information of the currently charged battery pack.
The battery charging system of claim 5 wherein said local monitoring module communicates with a battery management system of the battery pack via said communication switching module to receive a charging request and status information of the battery pack.
A battery charging system according to claim 1, wherein each of said charging channels comprises a normally open DC contactor, said local monitoring module effecting said on/off state of said charging channel by controlling said normally open DC contactor control.
The battery charging system of claim 6 wherein the communication of the charging module of each of the battery charging units with the battery management system of the battery pack and the communication with the local monitoring module employs a CAN bus protocol.
An electric vehicle charging station comprising:

At least one battery charging system according to any one of claims 1-8;

A remote monitoring module configured to communicate with a local monitoring module of the battery charging system.
The electric vehicle charging station of claim 9 wherein said remote monitoring module communicates with said local monitoring module using an Ethernet communication protocol.